"we have a kinder, gentler, politics under Kevin Rudd"
Dui,
Under Rudd, if an anaccomapnied 16 or 17yo boy comes as an asylum seeker, Tony Burke becomes his guardian.
This guardian then ensures the child gets the relevant health checks before being shipped off to PNG
Away from Australia, Burke is no longer the guardian and takes no further responsibility. In PNG the child is regarded as an adult (16+) and is put in with adult men.
While he is in indefinite detention with no hope of getting out for months (if ever) he is vulnerable to rape and torture. The assertion from multiple reputable sources is that this is happening. The Immigration Dept hears nothing, sees nothing, and does nothing. If the child seeks help he is sent straight back out into the general population for more of the same. Of course other vulnerable people are subject to the same, not just kids.
Burke / Rudd / ALP allow this scenario to happen for political expediency. They make all the right noises about great concern and enquiries. Regardless of whether rape / torture has / has not happened, the child should never be put in a situation where this is possible. There should be a tough line on asylum seekers to ensure that economic migrants are not targeting Australia, but that does not excuse subjecting 1000's of people to Rudd's Goulags. It does not allow you, once accepting responsibility for someone's welfare, not utterly abandon them. Contrast the the LNP who had much better resourcing of off shore processing because the numbers were much less. They were hard on asylum seekers but those who came were given all due care.
And to top it off, Rudd takes the foreign aid budget and blows it on this rubbish and bribing governments to do the dirty work. This is an absolute stain on Australia's reputation and history. Its utterly disgusting and indefensible. Meanwhile the left screams about TPVs and turning boats back when SAFE to do so.
If this is the reality from upholding the UN Convention on Refugees, we should withdraw from it immediately. Foreign aid should be spent on helping the needy and disadvantaged, not squandered on upholding and outdated ideology and buying votes.
